Chicken Lapeta is delicious, lip smacking dhaba style chicken dish. Lapeta means wrapped with masalas in thick gravy. Chicken Lapeta is irrestible chicken made with aromatic Indian spices.
Ingredients
1 kg Chicken with bones
3 sliced onions
2 tomatoes pureed
2 inch cinamon stick
2-3 cloves
2-3 tbsp oil
2 tbsp oil to fry chicken
For Marination
1 tbsp ginger garlic paste
1/2 cup yogurt
1 tsp turmeric power
2 tsp red chili powder
1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp kasuri methi powder
1/2 tsp garam masala powder
Salt to taste
To make lapeta masala paste
1tbsp coriander seeds
1/2 cup dry coconut
3 green chilies
10 cashew nuts
1 tsp pumpkin seeds
Handful coriander leaves
8 cloves of garlic
1 inch ginger
Method
Marinate the chicken with the ingredients under the heading For Marination for 4-5 hours.
Heat some oil in pan and saute onions till golden brown. Add pinch of salt to speed up the process. After it cools down make a fine paste of onions. Use water if required.
Roughly chop tomatoes and make puree of it. Keep aside. Soak cashews and pumpkin seeds in water for 10 minutes.
Dry roast coriander and coconut separately. Now grind all the ingredients under the heading To make lapeta masala paste
In an open pan, heat some oil and fry chicken in it. Chicken should be fried on medium flame, roughly 8-10 minutes on either side. This gives a wonderful golden colour to the chicken. Keep the fried chicken aside.
In another pan heat oil. Now add cinnamon and cloves. Then mix the onion paste and saute well. Then add the pureed tomatoes and saute it till it leaves oil on sides. After that mix the lapeta masala and saute it till the oil separates.
The oil from cashews and coconut will be released which imparts delicious flavour to the gravy. Add some water if required. The gravy will tend to get thick because of cashew paste. Adjust salt.
Now add the fried chicken in this gravy and cover and cook for 7-8 minutes. Garnish with fresh coriander leaves. It can be served with roti, paratha or rice.
